The US House of Representatives has passed the patent troll act by a huge majority despite opposition from educational institutions that had been making money flogging patents to trolls. The bill was designed to restrain patent trolls and cleared the House of Representatives with a majority of 325 to 91.

The legislation aimed to put an end to abuse of the patent system and make the necessary changes in order to ensure that the Act serves its purpose of protecting innovators and their inventions.

The legislation in question will make it harder for trolls to send a patent infringement letter. It also raises the stakes for filing and losing a case. Under the new law, a troll needs to list which patents and their parts are infringed and name the offending products or processes in the letter. The suggestions are that it will prevent vague letters demanding money or threatening a more expensive court case, because before sending any letter the trolls will have to do a lengthy and expensive discovery. In addition, if a plaintiff loses, they will have to cover court costs.

The Innovation Act is expected to be most effective against indiscriminate bulk filers – those send letters to both producers and consumers of technology claiming ownership of basic techniques like scanning and emailing documents. However, it probably won’t stop larger trolls looking forward to taking select cases to court. For example, Intellectual Ventures and IP Nav have expressed tentative support or mixed feelings for the new legislation, which probably means that they are able to get around it.

In the meantime, there was a huge lobby against the law by the likes of IBM, Microsoft, General Electric, Adobe and the universities, as those are known for making money though their huge patent portfolios.

Still, it seems that today people are more obsessed with patents rather than about inventing things. Apparently, the current system encourages them to be secretive and avoid publication of information before the “technology transfer office” has been able to file as many patents as it can. The industry experts confirm that only a few American universities will benefit from the current system, while most will lose cash on it.